4 Reasons Why Coding Backlogs are Extremely Costly

Posted January 8, 2018 by Kim Good

Procedure and Diagnosis Coding: Your Practice’s Pain in the Back(log)

Have you ever cleaned up your desk, your in-box, your vehicle or garage and come across things that cost you time and grief? Perhaps a great discount that expired? Forgetting an important opportunity that has now passed? Something you bought, but discovered you already had?

Backlogs are costlier than at first glance. Coding backlogs are extremely costly and here are the top 4 reasons why:

Your cash flow is delayed; therefore, you are either:

Paying more interest expense on debt; or

Missing investment income from cash you should be holding.

Money is lost.

When you get behind, you inevitably fail to code and bill some percent of procedures.

All your work then becomes done under pressure.

So, the number of mistakes increase.

A/R follow-up work consumes more time and effort.

Attitudes deteriorate productivity and performance.

Important work never gets done. You don’t have enough time and resources to:

“Proof” your own work.

Audit the process for completeness.

Stay current through continuing education.

It honestly doesn’t take many misses to lose a few percent of your revenue, just in the area of coding! Think about your practice’s dollar volume. Do you collect $10,000,000 annually? Losing a mere 3.7% due to inadequate, late or substandard coding costs you $370,000!!!

If nothing else compels you to take action, consider the fact that if you’re losing this much, just in coding, you are probably losing even more than this in inadequate A/R follow-up, effectively managing denied claims, not validating that all exams have made it to the billing system, and many other areas where leakage can occur.

Don’t waste another $100,000. Stop the bleeding and reach out to us for a free analysis of your practice. We can help you determine if you’re receiving all your hard-earned revenue.